


Spiral

by lovelikerain611



Category: Supernatural
Genre: AU, Drug Use, M/M, NSFW
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-05-10
Updated: 2015-10-31
Packaged: 2018-03-29 21:41:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 8
Words: 14,985
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3911665
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lovelikerain611/pseuds/lovelikerain611
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"He dreams that night of an angel with blue eyes and black wings, a lazy smile and a cigarette smoke kiss. The angel plants peace in his mind." A Druggie Destiel AU, wherein Castiel and Dean meet in rehab. warnings for: NSFW, major character death, drug use</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. sober

**Author's Note:**

> beta'd by ImpalaDreams/27spanx. iluhyouuu

The last time he was this sober, he’d woken up in the hospital, Sam sitting at his left, staring at the floor. “You can’t keep doing this, Dean,” he’d said, his voice rough. “You can’t keep this up.”

Dean hadn’t responded, counting the tiles on the ceiling. Sam left five minutes later, his shoulders tight and tense.  
  
This time, he isalone.

He’s not a hundred percent sure how he got here. It’s all flashes of light and sounds—his mind is jumbled. Sam was involved, somehow (Sam’s always involved, somehow, Sam’s always trying to save him), but his head hurts too badly to start picking through the pieces right now.

The things he does know are that he’s sober, he’s in some kind of a rehab facility, and he is very much alone.  
  
The room they have him in is dark and cool, to ward off the headaches. (That’s laughable. His head is pounding, aching, weighs a hundred pounds and it’s nothing compared to the bone-deep ache that spreads from his shoulders to his toes.) His mouth is dry, cottony and sticky. He reaches for the bottle that’s always always always there, and finds smooth plastic instead of the cold glass. It’s a bottle of water, and although Dean prefers something stronger, he chugs it in under a minute.

He regrets it almost immediately. His stomach churns unpleasantly, and he lurches to the bathroom, only to feel a tug at his arm. He looks down, sees the IV, and promptly vomits all over himself and the bed. When he’s finished, he pulls the IV out of his arm roughly and stumbles to a chair in the corner of the room.

The commotion brings a young woman in light blue scrubs to the room. “Mr. Winchester, what’re you doing?” she asks, keeping her voice smooth and even.

“The fuck does it look like?” Dean asks, rough and angry.

The girl in the pale blue just smiles blankly, generically polite, no emotion in her smile, her face wiped clean. She moves across the room to strip the sheets from the bed, shut the IV pump off, clean up the mess he’s made.

Dean watches her move (maybe she’d be his type 15 years ago, maybe she’d have been someone he flirted with, tried to pick up, made a naughty nurse joke to if he didn’t feel like absolute shit) and when she leaves, she points out the closet, where he will find clean pajamas, and the bathroom, where he can shower.

The shower soothes the ache that’s settled into his bones. He moves like he’s ninety, not 32, slow and measured, pained. When he comes out of the shower, there’s another girl in his room, armed with a fresh IV.

She’s older than the girl in pale blue; her face is set sterner, harder. She’s the horror stories he’s read about rehab; all hard edges and rough lines. The girl in pale blue is generically nice, polite, trained and gentle; this woman is a seasoned veteran, and she jabs the IV back in his arm, her hands and fingers rough. She hooks the fluids back up and shuts the lights off as she leaves.

He sleeps.

(This is his first interaction with the rehab staff.)

When he wakes up the second time, his stomach churns again. There’s nothing to come up. He coughs and dry heaves and sweats through his pajamas and the sheets. The girl in pale blue comes back, helps him get cleaned up. She doesn’t say anything beyond gentle commands (lift your arms, turn your head, stand up, sit down).

His first few days in rehab follow much the same pattern. They bring him jello and broth, crackers and ginger ale and Dean doesn’t want anything but whiskey. He eats begrudgingly, and rarely keeps it down.   
  
When he’s not dry heaving, he’s sweating, soaking his clothes and the sheets. He takes more showers in the first week of rehab than he’s had in the past month (which okay isn’t saying a lot) and when he finally does sleep, it’s restless and sporadic. 

Sam comes to visit around day four (maybe five, Dean doesn’t have the tightest grip on time and the way it passes) and he spends the time sitting next to Dean, his hands folded, his shoulders tight against his blazer, staring blankly at Dean’s knees.

He doesn’t say much to him. “We just want you to get better, Dean,” he says finally, before he leaves, and Dean doesn’t reply, just rolls over on his side and prays for sleep.  
  
The tremors finally ease off sometime around the fifth or sixth day–Dean’s not sure. Time moves in odd patches–in great leaps and snail-like crawls–and it doesn’t hold much meaning for him–it hasn’t in the past year.

He spends a week in the detox room. The girl in pale blue scrubs (today she’s wearing light purple, her soft blonde curls pulled up into a fountain on top of her head) puts a measurement to the time for him  _one week, you’ve been here one week_ , and he’s finally able to open his eyes without his stomach threatening to exit via his mouth.

The girl in pale blue tells him it’s been a week, and she pulls the IV out of his arm. She tells him to pack his things, that she’s going to walk him over to the cottage he’s been assigned to (cottage is a fucking stupid name for them, he thinks, they’re little more than two bedrooms and a bathroom).

So he packs his things (there isn’t much) and she walks him over.  Cottage number 6 is painted a light blue, with a white door. There’s a burnished brass number “6” on the door, and the doorknob matches.

“Good luck, Mr. Winchester,” the girl in pale blue says quietly, and she hesitates before patting his shoulder quickly.

He ignores her.

He turns the knob and the door swings in. Dean takes in the cottage.

The cottage is divided in two sides, with a hallway tiled in burnt orange dividing it. There are two doors on the right, and one on his left. The cottage opens up farther down the hallway, and at the end, there’s a window framed by white curtains.

Dean’s not focused so much on the curtains, or the window, or the garden he can just barely glimpse, but rather the man perched on the seat just below it—his roommate.  
  
His first impression of his roommate is, admittedly, poor. (He’s not sure what he expected–this is rehab, after all.) He’s a tall, lanky, rumpled man, with blue blue blue eyes and dark hair that flops over his eyes. He has the beginnings of a beard crawling up the sides of his face and he licks his lips and looks up when Dean walks in (he looks like hell, they both do) and lifts his hand in a wave. “Castiel,” he says after a moment, his voice gravel. “Heroin.”

“Dean,” Dean replies slowly. “Whiskey.”

Castiel nods thoughtfully, looking up at the ceiling of the cottage.

“I’ve put my stuff in that room—” he gestures to the door on Dean’s right—“but I can move if you’re into like, feng shui or whatever.” He takes a drag off the cigarette that dangles between his fingers. On the exhale, he gestures to the far doorway on the left. “That’s the bathroom, and there’s like, a couch and shit through there.” He swings his arm to the other side, and takes another drag. “Cigarette?” he asks solemnly, holding out a pack of Camels. “Bullshit, but it’s all they’ve got here,” he says. “In the fucking canteen. Fucking church camp.”

Dean licks his lips and sets his bag down inside the door. He reaches for a cigarette (he prefers Marlboro Reds, but it’s a peace offering), and that is how it begins.

“The hell kind of a name is Castiel, anyway?” Dean asks, reaching for his lighter.

Castiel chuckles and tilts his head back, blowing a thick plume of smoke out the window. He closes his eyes and shrugs. “I’m named after an angel,” he says. “I guess Lucifer was a little too…” he pauses, takes another drag, “dark for my parents’ taste.” He licks his lips, watches the sun start its descent. “I don’t think they intended for me to take the angel thing so literally.”

Dean frowns and tosses his duffle in the empty room on his left, leaning against the wall, crossing his arms.

“Spent my whole life trying to grow wings and fly,” Castiel says, taking another drag from the cigarette. “Heroin is the closest I ever got.”

Dean is quiet—this feels awfully personal for Castiel to be sharing with someone he just met, but it doesn’t seem to bother the other man—he’s too busy staring into the sky, taking drags off his shitty cigarette, sharing his soul with a man that just barely walked into his life. Dean walks past Castiel, drags one of the wooden chairs that sit around a small wooden table in the makeshift kitchen (which is generous, it’s a coffee pot and a mini fridge) and sits on it backwards, watching Castiel.

“So why’d you start?” Castiel asks after a moment, flicking the butt of his cigarette out the window. He turns to look at Dean, his blue eyes tired and solemn.

“Start?” Dean asks, stalling. He knows exactly what Castiel means, he’s just not sure he’s ready to bare his soul just yet.

“Alright, fine,” Castiel says with a lazy chuckle. He reaches for another cigarette. “We’ll save that conversation for another day.” He lights it, and follows the length of Dean’s body with his eyes. “You look like hell.”

Dean doesn’t respond, just smokes, and Castiel seems content with the silence, turning to look back out the window, body twisted around itself on the window seat. The fringe of his too-long hair brushes his collar. Dean tries not to think about it.

(There’s a peace that exudes from Castiel, and Dean tries to let it soak in, without thinking about how very, very strange it is that he feels comfortable with a complete stranger and heroin addict.)


	2. skin

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks to ImpalaDreams/27spanx/alexa for the beta. you're my beta half. lol
> 
> there's legit nekkid times in this chapter. ye be warned.

Castiel is a sloppy motherfucker who listens to strange music and doesn’t wear anything but dirty jeans and t-shirts. He forgoes shoes most of the time, and it irritates his group therapy leader so much Dean is pretty sure Castiel starts doing it just to irritate the man.

Dean’s not an upstanding citizen (this is rehab, after all) with his jeans and boots and band tees, but he keeps his shit together, keeps his side of the cottage clean. Castiel’s stuff just kind of migrates all over the place. His clothes are half spilling out of his suitcase, his bed is a tangled nest of sheets and blankets and pillows, and books and magazines are strewn all over his room. (They’re Castiel’s attempt at distracting himself from the aching need for smack. They deal with addiction in different ways—Castiel distracts distracts distracts, reads everything he can get his hands on, from trashy gossip rags to Dickens to Tolstoy, and he chain smokes like a chimney. Dean smokes and drinks coffee by the gallon, plugs his AC/DC in and tries to ignore the way his jaws ache.)

Their days are structured for them. They’re in different group therapy sessions (because their poisons are different, and Castiel jokes that they have them separated by how they take their poison—shooters, sippers, snorters, smokers—and Dean laughs and tells Castiel that he never sipped his poison, more swam in it), but Castiel convinces him to join him for yoga during the “exercise” portion of their day. Dean does it once, one time, and transfers onto the basketball team. Castiel laughs at him that night, a cigarette dangling from his fingertips, lips parted, blue eyes bright in his face as he pictures Dean stretched out in a downward dog, ass up, sweating and cursing.

So they spend their days talking about their feelings and their nights chain smoking and drinking bad coffee. Castiel’s long and lean, wiry, and he doesn’t understand personal space. Dean doesn’t mind after the first few nights they spend awake and aching for a fix. Detox was hell, but this is almost worse—Dean spends endless hours staring at his ceiling, craving the burn of the alcohol, and even though his body is adjusting to life without it, his mind isn’t. Castiel makes the first move, presses his lips against Dean’s between another cup of coffee and Dean’s third cigarette of the night (he’s just getting started) and Dean doesn’t push him away. 

(Castiel kisses differently than anyone Dean has ever kissed, throws everything he has into it, presses his lips against Dean’s and doesn’t apologize, just barely asks permission.)

It starts with kissing, and progresses quickly. They kiss, they make out, and then one night, they’re sitting in the middle of Castiel’s room and there’s cigarette smoke like a haze over their heads (they’re not supposed to smoke in the cottages, but they’re also not supposed to make out with their roommates), and Castiel’s got his lips pressed against Dean’s and his hands are on his shoulders, hot and heavy, pressing Dean into the mattress.

And one minute they’re on his shoulders and the next they’re fumbling with the elastic on his sweatpants and Dean almost protests (because it’s wrong, it’s so fucking wrong), but Castiel’s hand is around his dick and really—

He comes embarrassingly fast, three minutes of a sloppy hand job and he’s there, and maybe it’s the way Castiel’s fingers curl around him, maybe it’s the way his lips feel against his throat, maybe it’s the way Castiel just goes for it, like an addict. Maybe it’s just that Dean’s never really been this fuckhard in love with someone before, never fallen this fast before, never been so consumed by anything other than the drink before.

He grunts his release into Castiel’s shoulder, shudders and comes and Castiel chuckles, this warm, lazy chuckle that’s like summer, somehow, like summer days when he and Sammy would lay by the lake, before his life went to hell, before he ended up in rehab not really being rehabilitated, just trading one vice for another.

That’s what it is—that’s what it starts as. They trade in their vices for each other, for Castiel’s mouth and Dean’s fingers in his hair, for the slide-scratch of Castiel’s stubble against his thighs, for Dean’s whispered pleas, like prayers against his skin. Castiel abandons his books for Dean, spends his nights fucking Dean into the mattress instead of reading.

(Castiel’s the sweetest poison he’s ever tasted, but he won’t admit it. He jerks Castiel off and sucks his fingers clean and he’s never done that before, never, until Castiel, and he kind of likes it, but he’ll never admit it.) 

He starts calling Castiel “Cas” after that, and Cas smirks and shakes his head, but doesn’t say anything, just turns a page in his book and pictures Dean naked and begging, voice cracking on the “Cas.”

It’s four in the morning and Dean is half-dozing when Castiel barges into his room, eyes wild. He doesn’t give Dean the opportunity to ask anything, just pins him to the bed and kisses him, hard and dirty. Dean doesn’t protest, letting his hands run up the back of Castiel’s t-shirt, feel along the muscles of his back and shoulders, and then run down, dipping below his waistband to grip his ass, pressing his thumbs against the dip in his spine.

He groans into Dean’s mouth and he grinds his erection against his thigh, rubbing a hand down his chest. Dean grunts when he scrapes his fingers under the waistband of his sweats and his hands go to Castiel’s hair. “Cas, what’re you—” he breaks off in a groan when Castiel takes him into his mouth, his fingers tightening in his hair, head falling back against the pillow.

His movements are deliberate but needy, taking Dean down and then sliding his mouth off again, working his tongue into the slit, sucking hard at the tip. Dean looks down and Castiel looks up, his eyes blue like the ocean after a storm, lips stretched around his cock, dirty and wrong, but still the best he’s ever had.

He warns Castiel, but the other man takes him deeper, and Dean comes with a muffled shout, his fist pressed against his mouth as he drinks him down.

Castiel doesn’t really even give Dean time to catch his breath before he’s pinning him to the mattress, fucking him slow and deep. The whimpers Dean makes are almost sinful, a little rough and needy, a little loud, and Castiel presses his forearm against Dean’s lips and that makes it that much better; Dean’s eyes roll up in his head, and he’s half hard again when Castiel comes.

(He’s silent when he comes, just a sharp gasp and his free hand tightens on Dean’s hip, his arm bumping into Dean’s mouth as his thrusts pick up in speed, shaking the whole bed.)

They’re both breathless, Castiel collapsing down on top of Dean with a satisfied groan. Dean shoves at the other man’s shoulders until Castiel is curled up against the wall of Dean’s room and Dean is on the far side of the bed. They’re quiet for a moment, and then Castiel speaks.

“I think now you owe me,” he says, his voice sleepy and scratchy.

“Owe you?” Dean repeats, and he turns to look at the other man. They’re tangled around each other and Dean has just lit an after-sex cigarette.

“Yeah,” Castiel grunts, shifting under Dean so he’s more comfortable. “I showed you mine.”

Dean frowns. “Cas, what the hell are you talking about?” he says finally, because he doesn’t understand, he doesn’t know what the other man is talking about, he’s got no idea.

“Why you started,” Castiel says, soft and slow. He reaches for Dean’s pack of cigarettes over his shoulder. He stopped buying the Camels two days after Dean moved into the cottage; said Dean’s shitty cigarettes would do just fine, and Dean pretended to care for a day or two, but now—now it’s just one more thing of his Castiel has laid claim to. “Why you started drinking.”

Dean bites his lip, staring at a spot on the wall. He doesn’t want to talk about this.

Castiel drops an arm around Dean’s shoulders, rubs a thumb into the skin. “You can tell me,” he says softly. “I won’t—I could never—I’m a fucking heroin addict, Dean. I—”

“It’s nothing you haven’t heard before,” Dean says gruffly. “My dad—he was an abusive alcoholic, but I idolized him, because that’s what little boys do and my dad drank because he hurt, so I drank because I hurt.” Dean flicks the butt of the cigarette into the glass cup on his bedside table. “That’s it, okay?” He sighs, heavy, and shrugs out from under the other man’s arm. “Can we—I don’t want to talk about this anymore.”

Castiel bites his lip, looks up at Dean. He sighs and presses a hand against Dean’s face. “Yeah, okay,” he says, soft. “Alright.” He pulls Dean closer, kisses him. “Want me to leave?” he asks, soft, unsure, after a pause.

Dean shakes his head, and leans in to kiss the other man again.

That’s all that’s said the rest of the night.

They start swapping support group stories over sex and cigarettes.

Tonight, Castiel’s got his head in Dean’s lap, his eyes closed, a cigarette between his fingers. He blows a thick plume of smoke out over the ceiling and sighs. Dean watches the smudges of Castiel’s eyelashes against his cheeks and his fingers itch to trace the line his cheekbones make. 

He takes a deep breath instead. “So there’s this chick in my group,” he says and Castiel hums lazily. “Crazy bitch. Gets high off fucking cough syrup.”

Castiel grins. “I’ve had a NyQuil high,” he says lazily.

“Did you strip down naked and go for a swim in the public pool?” Dean asks.

“…Not on a NyQuil high,” Castiel says after a moment. “I think that was during my meth phase.”

“You had a meth phase?” Dean asks, looking down at the other man. He’s still sprawled out in Dean’s lap and he opens his eyes at the disbelief in Dean’s voice.

“Are you really surprised?” he asks calmly. “I told you I was trying to find wings, Dean.” He sits up in the bed, folds himself into the space next to Dean. “The meth phase only lasted two weeks.” He clears his throat. “Is that a problem, Dean?” His voice is quiet. Dean knows that if he says yes, if he tells Castiel that he can handle all his crazy but that piece, Castiel will leave, will walk out of his room and mind his own business.

“No,” Dean says after a moment. “No, Cas. Just surprised.” He reaches to pat the other man on the leg, hesitates, and then does it, pat pat, two quick touches to his upper thigh.

Castiel looks up at him, his eyes bright. “Good.” He wraps his fingers around Dean’s. “Your friend who likes NyQuil—strips down?”

Dean nods, tries to ignore the way Castiel’s skin against his has his nerve endings on fire. “Yeah—this chick—she gets all doped up on NyQuil and like, fifty pills—”

“You didn’t tell me she was a snorter, too,” Castiel interjects and Dean rolls his eyes.

“Fucker. Anyway—this chick gets higher than a fucking kite, marches herself down to the public pool, strips naked and dives in.” He takes a drag off his cigarette. “Says she would have gotten away with it too, if there wasn’t an old folks’ home next door. She says they saw everything, called the cops. She gets arrested for public indecency—court-ordered rehab.”

Castiel nods thoughtfully. “So is she here for pills or NyQuil?” he asks and Dean shakes his head.

“I don’t know, man. She spends all of group talking about how when she gets out she’s going to plant a rose garden.”

“A rose garden,” Castiel repeats, flicking his cigarette butt into the ever-present glass at Dean’s bedside. He licks his lips, straddles the other man. “Why?”

“I try not to ask,” Dean replies, gripping Castiel’s hips. “Crazy bitch, I told you.”

Castiel chuckles and runs his lips up Dean’s neck. “We’re all a little crazy.”

Dean closes his eyes, and doesn’t think about the crazy chick in his group and her roses, doesn’t think about anything at all, except the way Castiel feels against him, all skin and cigarettes and sex.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapters 1-4 are posted on my Tumblr, paper-mache-lungs. If you add /tagged/spiral/chrono to the end of my URL, they pop up in order! cool.


	3. family

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ur my favorite thing, alexa

On Saturdays, there’s a three hour block outlined for family time.

Dean doesn’t expect anyone to come, but Sam proves him wrong. His baby brother is sitting at one of the picnic tables just outside the cafeteria, and his wife, Jess, is next to him. Jess looks nervous. There was a time (before it all got so bad that Dean lost all rapport he had with the woman who lays a bigger claim to Sammy now) that Dean would have teased her. You look like they’re going to bite you, he would have said, sitting down across from his little brother and Jess. They only bite if you show ‘em you’re scared. Addicts can smell fear, see, so you gotta bark bigger. And Jess would have laughed, and smacked his arm, and called him an ass and Sammy’s face would have lit up, bright and happy, and clapped Dean on the shoulder and How’re you doing, feeling better? And he would have looked so hopeful.

But that opportunity is long gone, now—Dean waved as it tripped off into the sunset and he and Jess may as well be strangers. (She’s only here because Sam is, Dean knows.)

He sits down across from his brother roughly. Sam looks up. “Dean!” he says, and the hope in his voice is enough to make Dean’s stomach cramp.

“Sam—” he starts, but Sam is standing up, his giant of a little brother, and then he’s hugging him. Dean doesn’t hug back and Sam lets go and backs off awkwardly after a minute.

“You—you feel better?” he asks, and clears his throat.

Dean shrugs.

“Cause I’ll be honest, man, you still look like… hell.”

Jess frowns at her husband. Dean licks his lips and looks over at his cottage, which he can see just barely. Castiel is spending this time reading and bullshitting his journal. Dean would rather be getting fucked silly, or bullshitting his own journal, or hell, anywhere but here with his little brother and the almost-little sister, choking on the hope in Sam’s eyes and his voice.

“Still feel like hell,” Dean says gruffly. “Not a magic wand, Sammy.”

Sam sighs and picks at a spot on the table. “You need anything?” he asks finally, after the silence has grown long and awkward.

Dean doesn’t respond and Sam clears his throat.

“O-Okay. Well. We uh—we love you. Mom’s going to come next week.”

“I don’t want her to. I don’t want any of you to.”

“She said she’d bring apple pie,” Sam continues, like he hasn’t heard Dean. “And the four of us can eat it. It’ll be like—like old times.”

Dean doesn’t say anything and Sam sighs, standing up from the table. He pats Dean’s shoulder after a moment of hesitation. “Bye, Dean,” he says quietly, and Jess puts her tiny hand on his back.

“Bye,” she echoes, small and quiet next to his behemoth of a brother.

Dean doesn’t say anything, and he stands up from the table and is halfway back to the cottage before they’ve even gotten in their car.

“How was family day?” Castiel calls when he hears the cottage door click open and shut. Dean doesn’t respond and it prompts Castiel out of his room, his dark hair disheveled, his eyes narrowed. “You look like shit,” he says after a minute.

“I need a fucking drink,” Dean growls, and he goes to the mini fridge, but there’s nothing there he wants.

Cas is quiet behind him. Calm, collected. Dean can feel him a step behind. He steps closer, resting his hands on Dean’s ribs, through his shirt. He sighs softly and then rests his head against Dean’s shoulder. The contact is unexpectedly soothing. Dean’s hands ease on the sides of the mini fridge. He closes the door, folds his arms, presses his forehead against the cool metal of the fridge.

“The fucking hope in his eyes, Cas,” Dean says softly, and his voice cracks and he hates it, but he has to get it out. “Makes me sick. I just wanna—I just want—I—he’s my brother, Cas, he’s my brother, and I—I was supposed to—when Dad didn’t—I was supposed to be his—his fucking role model and I’m just—I’m not—”

Cas sighs and presses his lips against the ridge of Dean’s shoulder through his shirt.

“The hope in his face,” Dean repeats, quieter, and Cas wraps his arms tighter around Dean’s waist.

“He doesn’t understand,” Castiel says finally, choosing the words carefully, picking over them, walking on eggshells. “He doesn’t understand.”

Dean doesn’t say anything, just grips Castiel’s wrist, grounds himself, soaks in some of the peace radiating off the other man.

(Castiel asks him once if he wants to talk about it more, and Dean ignores him. Castiel doesn’t bring it up again.)

Castiel fucks him into the mattress that night, hard, harder than usual. Dean appreciates it, relishes in it, lets himself forget about his baby brother and his almost-sister and all the stars he tore out of their eyes in favor of the way Castiel feels above him, the quiet grunts he makes as he ruts against Dean, one hand gripping the back of his thigh, the other pressed into the opposite hip.

There are bruises the next day and Dean is sore. It feels good, to hurt for a reason, to be sore and achy because of a good fuck. He focuses on the physical pain, on the way his ass still smarts a bit when he sits down for group therapy, on the way his lips still feel chapped and swollen, on the catch in his left hip, the hip Castiel pressed back almost too far. It feels good.

That night, he sucks Castiel off in front of the window, Castiel splayed wanton and open on the window seat, his ass bare against the cool blue cushion. Dean grins around the other man’s cock, thinks about all the ways the counselors would protest if they walked by now, Castiel’s naked back pressed against the cool glass of the window, his cock down Dean’s throat.

He tries to warn Dean, tugs at his hair, but Dean closes his eyes and takes him deep, swallows him down.

Dean lights their cigarettes after, and he savors the taste of the Reds mixed with the bitter-salty burn of Castiel still resting at the back of his throat.

“You didn’t have to do that,” Castiel says lazily, stretched out in the window seat. Dean is on the floor below him, back against the cool wood, ass against the tile. “I mean, I don’t expect you to swallow.”

He’s so matter-of-fact, so blunt. It’s refreshing. Dean smirks and blows a plume of smoke upwards. “I know,” he rasps, and keeps it short. (He doesn’t feel like sharing that Castiel’s one of the few people he’s swallowed for, that he only does it because he hopes a little bit of the peace Castiel radiates will take hold in his soul.)

Cas’ hand rests on the top of his head, the palm pressed against the crown, his fingers combing through the short locks soothingly, nails scratching against his scalp. (It’s thank you, and Dean sees it for what it is. No more words are exchanged that night, and Dean is more at peace than he’s been in the last 15 years.)

Friday night (before Dean’s family comes in the morning, before he has to face the hope in Sammy’s face, before he has to choke down his mother’s apple pie with his regret and the sorrys he never said) Castiel presses his forearm against Dean’s hips and takes him down his throat.

Dean chokes out a groan and flexes his hips; Castiel smirks over the ridge his hipbone makes and presses him harder against the mattress.

“Easy,” he breathes, easing his mouth off of Dean. He kisses at the tender skin of his inner thigh. “Easy.”

Dean grunts and cants against the bar of Castiel’s arm across his hips. Castiel chuckles, breath hot against the arch of Dean’s cock. He licks a stripe up to the tip, sucking the head into his mouth, and taking him down again.

“Jesus,” Dean breathes, “Cas, I–”

Castiel doesn’t reply–he can’t reply, he’s just taken Dean deeper, swallowing around him.

Dean grunts, too loud, presses his fist against his mouth, his hips jerking against Castiel’s arm.

Castiel looks up at him, and Dean looks down, and the sight of Castiel’s blue blue eyes looking up at him, his lips stretched around his cock is enough to have him coming.

Dean shouts and grips the back of Castiel’s head. Cas’s eyes close and he swallows, pressing his nose against the curly hair at the base of his dick, pressing both hands against Dean’s hips, pinning him to the mattress.

“You look better this week, man,” Sam says, forced normal, sitting across from his brother.

“How do you feel, Dean?” his mother asks, her voice soft. She reaches for his hand, presses her fingers against the back of his knuckles.

Dean licks his lips, stares at the table. Tries not to think about Castiel’s mouth around him, tries not to think about anything at all. “Fine, Mom.” He keeps his answers short. Staccato.

His mother sighs, pulls her hands back. “Dean—”

“I’m fine,” he says again. “Yeah, this—this rehab thing—totally awesome.”

“Dean, we’re just trying to help,” his mother says.

“Yeah, well. Don’t.”

He looks back over at the cottage, and reaches for his cigarettes.

He bullshits the journal he’s supposed to be keeping, fills it with letters to his mother he’ll never send, with apologies to Sammy he’ll never say. Dean knows why he drinks—he knows he’s fucked up, he knows that he’s let his mother and baby brother down, and he knows he can’t ever repair those relationships.

He doesn’t like to talk about how he feels. (Dean knows how he feels, that’s the whole point. He knows how he feels and he doesn’t want to feel that way so he drinks.) The leader of the group therapy session suggests that they find healthier outlets for their feelings, like painting.

Dean does not paint. He does not write. Dean drinks, and he works on cars, and he drinks. That is what Dean does, and he tells his group therapy leader as much. The group therapy leader just gives him this absent, vacant smile and suggests that he take this opportunity to find a new hobby.

He’s just doing what the group therapy leader suggested, he reasons, stroking up Castiel’s length slowly, sweetly, watching the other man come unraveled slowly. He’s just investing in his new hobby, perfecting it. He twists his wrists, smoothing his thumb over the beads of precome, watching Castiel’s face.

He loves to watch Castiel’s face when he’s jerking him off. The man is mostly silent, but his expressions speak volumes. And he loves Castiel’s come face. His eyelids flutter, he sits up a little straighter. His head tilts back, and his jaw clenches, unclenches, clenches again, and then his mouth falls open. There’s a sharp intake of air that’s released on a grunt at the same time his cock spasms and bounces in Dean’s grip, painting his abdomen in ropes of white come. (Maybe he is a painter after all, Dean reasons, running his tongue up Castiel’s stomach, cleaning up the mess he’s made.)


	4. bones

Castiel is thin.

Dean realizes it one night, straddling one of the kitchen chairs and watching Castiel blow smoke out the window. He’s perched on the window seat in nothing but his boxers. Cas’ eyes are fixed on the smoke spiraling out the window, and it gives Dean the opportunity to watch him without getting caught.

He’s thin and lanky, and he drapes himself on the air, doesn’t walk through it so much as glides with it. Even sitting on the window seat his limbs are long and framed so as not to disturb the air. He’s relaxed. Easy. A part of the space rather than disrupting it.

Dean feels like the opposite—bold and brash and loud. He’s always entered a room like he owned it—years of his father telling him to man up, years of his father yelling at him to walk like a man, walk like he had something to be proud of has starched his spine, made him stand taller, walk straighter. Dean walks with a purpose, he enters a room. Dean makes himself a force to reckoned with; a hurricane to Cas’ summer rain.

Castiel looks over as Dean is working his eyes down his legs and he laughs. “Shall I pose for you?” he asks on a chuckle, turning in the window seat.

Dean rolls his eyes. “I’m just—admiring the view,” he says. He doesn’t have to apologize. He doesn’t. He’s seen (and felt) every inch of Castiel intimately—he has nothing to be ashamed of.

“Paint me like one of your French girls,” Castiel says breathily, and then dissolves into laughter, flicking the butt of his cigarette out the open window. He unfolds himself from the window seat and rubs a hand over his stubble.

Dean rolls his eyes. “You asshole.”

They watch each other jack off later, in Castiel’s room. Dean watches Cas’ hand on his cock, the familiar strokes up and down the shaft, and his eyes flick up to watch Castiel’s face, his head thrown back as he pleasures himself. He says Dean’s name when he comes, and Dean is quick to follow, painting Castiel in ropes of white.

Castiel rolls his eyes, sitting up on the bed, covered in Dean’s spunk and his own. “Kinky bastard,” he chuckles, wiping at himself with a t-shirt.

Dean watches him, caught up in the afterglow, just watches the beautiful man he didn’t expect to love.

“What’re your plans, when you get out?” Castiel asks one night, or morning, technically, it’s 230 in the morning and they’re sitting at the sort of kitchen table, the pack of Reds between them. Dean taps the butt of his lighter against the table and shrugs.

“Have a drink,” he says bluntly. “Have a drink and then have another. Then go find a job. Carry on the way I was before.” He looks up at Castiel to find the other man with his eyes on him, blue and open. Waiting. “You?”

“Avoid my sister, and my brothers,” Castiel replies. “Find some smack.” He pauses, presses his thumb into the grain of the table. “Find you.”

It’s Dean’s turn to look up now, green eyes wide. “Cas–”

Cas doesn’t say anything, just fixes his jaw and looks at Dean. “Please,” he says finally. “Please, Dean.”

Dean is quiet. He takes a drag from his cigarette. “What, live together?” he asks finally, looking up at the other man.

Castiel is quiet, but he’s watching Dean, blue eyes fixed on green.

“Like—like—what? Like roommates? Like—” lovers he wants to say, but it sounds to pretty, too frilly, too golden and clean to describe what they are.

Castiel shrugs. “Yes. Does it—do you have to label it?”

Dean doesn’t respond, looking down at the table. He rubs his forehead and takes a drag off his cigarette.

Castiel sighs and reaches for the pack of cigarettes. He doesn’t say anything, but he doesn’t need to; Dean can read it all in his posture, in the way he perches on the chair, in the curve of his shoulders and the jut of his elbows.

Dean licks his lips. This is an opportunity. “Yeah, okay,” he says, and the grin that splits Castiel’s face makes him ache.

He aches in a different way that night, when Cas’ cock stretches him open. Dean groans, too loud, and Castiel presses his hand against his mouth, his other hand cupping Dean’s hip. He leaves his hand there, warm and soft, but firm against Dean’s mouth and Dean shouts his release into Castiel’s palm, spilling between them.

“When we get out of here,” Castiel whispers, snapping his hips forward—Dean whimpers into Cas’ hand, it’s too much, he’s too sensitive—“I’m going to listen to you scream til you’re hoarse.” He grunts and his cock twitches inside of Dean. Dean arches back against the bed, eyes closed. Castiel makes a quiet noise at the sight Dean makes against the bed, spent and sprawled out, panting against Cas’ hand.

It’s all he needs before he’s coming too, snapping his hips flush against Dean’s and grunting softly as he empties into the other man’s ass.

The rehab has a graduation ceremony. It comes two months after Dean woke up with his tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth. The therapist he sees every other day, one-on-one, hands him a card for an AA group.

“Your first meeting is three days after you’re released,” she says. “Please don’t miss it.”

Dean tucks the card into his pocket. He has no intention of going to any meetings, but he’ll play the game. “Thanks.”

She nods. “Congratulations.”

Dean gets up to leave. His hand is on the doorknob when she speaks again.

“It’s a bad idea, for you to room with Castiel.”

Dean doesn’t say anything. He licks his lips and turns the knob.

“Please just think about it,” she says quietly.

Dean lets the door click shut behind him. He has thought about it. He’s done nothing but think about it since Cas brought it up—how Cas would look in their bed, how it would feel to have sex in their apartment, what it would be like to live with Cas indefinitely, to call him his, really and truly his—

Dean’s thought about it. It’s done nothing to change his mind.

Castiel doesn’t look like Cas—he looks like Castiel.

Dean’s drawn a distinction in his mind between Cas and Castiel—Cas is loose and lazy, sloppy and sexy, all easy smirks and cigarette smoke kisses. Castiel is the one standing in the mirror, dressed in the one pair of slacks he has and a crisp white button down. His hair’s long enough to be ridiculous—long enough that it brushes against the collar of the shirt.

Castiel makes a noise of frustration in the back of his throat and Dean steps in front of him, leaning against the sink, reaching to fix the tie.

The tie matches his eyes and Dean’s stomach feels weird.

“You look like a fucking tax accountant,” Dean accuses, clearing his throat, tightening the silk.

“I feel like a fucking stiff,” Cas mutters, his eyes softening as Dean fusses with his collar over his tie.

“Quit looking at me like a chick,” Dean grumbles. “I’m just—I just—I needed the bathroom and you were hogging the mirror.”

Castiel smirks and leans in close, pressing his hands against Dean’s hips. He presses a kiss against the corner of Dean’s mouth. “I love you too.”

Dean’s mother is there.

Dean’s mother, and Sam, and Jess—they’re all three there, sitting with the rest of the families. His mother’s smile is blindingly bright. Sam looks hopeful and proud, and even Jess is grinning ear to ear.

It makes him feel sick. There’s five of them graduating today, and all five of them are lined up in chairs on a makeshift stage. He’s sitting next to Castiel, fidgeting. He’s anxious, nervous. Seeing his family so proud makes him hurt, makes him ache.

Castiel presses the back of his hand against Dean’s thigh, subtle enough that no one else notices, but enough that Dean relaxes at the contact. He lets Cas’ peace seep into his pores, lets it fill him up. He focuses on Castiel, and nothing but Castiel, until they call his name and everyone claps.

He focuses his eyes on Castiel, on the blue blue eyes that watch him, shining with what could be mistaken as pride, but it’s not.

It’s want.

Cas sucks him off in the bathrooms before they have to go meet their families. It’s hot and dirty and fast—Cas pins him to the wall with his hands on his hips, pulls at his slacks, and sucks him down. Dean has to fight to keep from thrusting his hips, has to tangle his fingers in Cas’ hair to keep himself anchored. Cas bobs his head, and looks up at Dean, mouth stretched wide, eyes blue and gleaming with lust and love and a million other emotions Dean doesn’t care to analyze at the moment.

Even when he meets Castiel’s family—there’s a lot of them, Cas has a lot of brothers—all he can picture are Cas’ blue eyes gazing up at him, full of adoration and ownership.

His mother wraps her arms around him. He tries to hug her back, he does. She pulls back after a moment and cups his face in her cool hands.

“Dean, baby, I’m so proud of you.”

The words burn. He swallows. “Mom—”

“We’re taking you to lunch,” she interrupts, smoothing her hands down his shoulders. “You look so nice, Dean. I’m so proud of you.” It’s quieter when she says it this time and Dean can’t breathe, can’t think past the desperation in her eyes.

She doesn’t expect it to last.

Sam claps him on the shoulder, grips his hand, pulls him into a hug. He hugs back half-heartedly, patting his brother’s back. Sam’s hug lasts longer than their mother’s. Dean lets go before Sam does.

Cas wanders over and Dean steps out of Sam’s shadow.

“Mom, this, uh. This is Cas. Castiel.”

Mary turns and smiles. It doesn’t reach her eyes. “One of your friends?” she asks.

“Something like that,” Dean says, exchanging a glance with Castiel. “We uh—we were roommates. We are roommates. I’m living with Castiel. We’ve got—they set us up with an apartment.” It comes out roughly, stunted. Awkward.

“Oh,” his mother says softly, and looks at Sam.

Sam looks a little dumbstruck, and then he seems to shake it off. “That’s—that’s great, Dean,” he says. “That’s—I’m glad you have a—a friend. I’m glad you’ve got a plan. That both of you have a—a plan. Have each other.”

“It’s nice to meet you Cas-Castiel,” his mother says finally, forcing a smile.

She doesn’t expect it to last.

Castiel just smiles and presses his hand against Dean’s thigh. It’s okay, it’ll be alright.


	5. ruin

The apartment they rent is not good, it’s barely livable, but it is theirs, and there is a couch in the living room and a mattress they can fuck each other on and dishes in the kitchen and food in the refrigerator, sometimes.

Sam comes in when he drops Dean off, pronounces it suitable and leaves. He fills the fridge with groceries and drops a fifty on the counter in the kitchen. For Dean. Castiel takes it, splits it. Half on a bottle of whiskey, half on smack.

They last seven hours after they graduate from rehab, after Dean chokes down the steak his mother insisted he get, after Sam and Jess and his mother all watch him, waiting. Seven hours.

Cas has changed out of his slacks and starchy shirt, left the tie on the floor of the bedroom (Dean’s gotten used to the mess now, gotten used to Castiel leaving pieces of himself wherever he goes), and he’s dressed in nothing but a pair of dirty jeans.

He’s smoked half a pack of Dean’s cigarettes already, and he reaches for the heroin. Dean expects to see him tremble, but he doesn’t. (He’s not surprised when he doesn’t; even when he’s so close to the fix he’s been craving for months he still radiates calm.)

They get drunk and high together, sitting on the couch, barefoot and bare chested. Dean watches Castiel’s tongue when he measures some of the white powder out, melts it down, draws it up. It’s hypnotizing, Castiel’s pink tongue pressed against his bottom lip, his eyes blue like the summer sky washed by the rain.

“We shouldn’t,” Dean says once, only once, staring at the whiskey in his glass, imagining the burn down his throat.

“Then don’t,” Castiel says, voice smooth. He straddles Dean, a dirty smile on his lips, the syringe clutched in his fist. He smells like cigarettes and sweat and Cas and Dean’s hands go to his hips, to his jean-clad ass. Castiel leans down to press his lips against Dean’s ear. “I dare you,” he whispers and Dean isn’t sure if Cas is daring him to or not to, but he has a pretty good idea and he pulls his hands around to pull at the button of his jeans.

He’s commando, naked against the denim, half-hard already. Dean sighs and reaches for the whiskey as Castiel pulls at his belt.

Castiel uses the belt as a tourniquet and Dean drinks the whiskey in one swallow, watching Castiel with dark eyes. He hisses when the needle goes into his skin and Dean watches his face as he presses the plunger, watches Castiel’s eyes drift closed, watches his shoulders relax. He licks his lips and pulls the belt off his arm, smiling at Dean lazily, his pupils blown wide.

“Better,” Castiel breathes, leaning down to press his lips against Dean’s. Dean groans and fumbles around inside Cas’ jeans, reaching for his cock, fisting it loosely.

Cas grunts and presses dirty, wet kisses against Dean’s neck, hips bucking into Dean’s fist.

He’s off of him then, pulling back, standing up, all loose limbs and sex hair, rumpled and worn, but sexy and beautiful.

(And fuck, but Dean loves him like this. He loves the Castiel he met in rehab, but he loves this one more, loose and horny, lazy and sexy.) Dean takes another swallow of whiskey and stands, only to kneel at Castiel’s feet, pulling at the jeans until they’re halfway down his thighs and taking his cock into his mouth. And he tastes like Cas and whiskey, and there’s never been a sweeter way to spiral.)

Castiel makes these noises when his cock is in Dean’s mouth, and some of it has to do with the heroin but most of it has to do with Dean’s cocksucking lips, with the way the sunshine filtering in through the dirty windows plays against his face, with those green green eyes staring up at him like he’s the only thing he’ll ever need ever again.

Castiel sighs and presses his cock into Dean’s mouth, groaning deep in his throat when Dean breathes through his nose and takes him deep. Dean looks up at him then, green eyes and lips stretched and he pulls out of Dean’s mouth, gripping him tight by his upper arms and pulling him up. He kisses Dean hot and rough, and tastes himself with the whiskey and the cigarettes still resting at the back of Dean’s throat.

“Let’s go to the bed,” Castiel breathes against Dean’s skin, kissing down his face and shoulders. “I wanna fuck you, wanna make you scream. Wanna hear you beg for it when we don’t have to worry about fucking—” he sucked a bruise into the other man’s shoulder “—fucking guidance counselors walking in on us. Fuck.” Castiel chuckled against Dean’s smooth skin and the other man pressed him backwards, stumbling on the jeans pulled halfway down his legs.

Dean brings the whiskey and Castiel’s heroin and he offers him the syringe before sinking into the mattress. Castiel shakes his head and jerks at Dean’s pants, pulling them off and then the black boxer briefs, ducking to suck at his leaking cock quickly.

“I love the way you taste,” Castiel growls, pressing Dean’s legs up quickly and licking at his puckered hole.

It’s fast and dirty. Castiel comes first, his abs clenching, his head thrown back. He looks like something out of a nightmare when he looks down at Dean, high off the smack and the orgasm, his blue eyes blown wide, his mouth twisted in a smirk, radiating power. He jerks at Dean’s cock almost leisurely until Dean is arching against him, painting his stomach with ropes of white.

There’s an easy quiet, marked by their heavy breathing that makes Dean feel better than the sex. It’s the first time he’s felt at peace since before he started drinking, since before the demons got too big, too much, too fast for him to catch. Even at rehab, there was always the undercurrent of tension, of what if what if what if, and maybe it’s the alcohol in his veins, maybe it’s the orgasm still buzzing pleasantly through his system, maybe it’s just Cas, just this beautiful man who holds him in the palm of his hand, but he feels more at peace now than he has in years.

Castiel watches Dean doze off, lying on his stomach beside the other man, watching him quietly. The heroin is easing off, the high he’s craved for 3 months now finally satisfied (for the moment). Sleep tugs at his mind, but he fights it off, watching Dean doze off on their mattress. The sunlight plays on the sweat on Dean’s skin, and Castiel watches it lazily before sitting up on the mattress.

He licks his lips and ruffles a hand through his hair, sliding off the mattress and padding to the kitchen to pick through the groceries Sam and Jess brought. He settles on an apple and eats it, cross-legged on the mattress, watching Dean sleep.

(He’s always had a peace he carried with him, but it radiates now, and Castiel smiles, watching the man he didn’t expect to love sleep.)

Dean works as a mechanic. It’s the only marketable skill he’s got, aside from becoming a master at making Castiel come, and he’s really not up for marketing that one. He doesn’t make a killing, but he makes enough to pay rent, enough to support their habits, and that’s what’s important.

He’s surprised at how fast his tolerance for the alcohol builds. It isn’t any time at all before he can drink himself to sleep and still work in the morning.

It helps that Cas is there, and Cas is always, always there. When Dean gets up for work, he makes him coffee. When Dean gets off work, he meets him at the door with a beer and drags him off to their room. Most times, they only make it to the couch.

Dean loves the Cas he met in rehab. He loves this one more.

Cas when he’s high is a force to be reckoned with. He wakes Dean in the middle of the night with a mouth around his cock, hands splayed against his thighs, taking him down his throat. He looks up at Dean, and Dean groans, Cas’ pupils blown wide. He’s wild and sexy, sex, drugs, and rock and roll in one, a hurricane who leaves Dean hard and aching and wanting more.

Castiel sucks him off, makes him come, drinks him down. He presses kisses up from his softening cock, up to his lips, and then kisses him, hard, all tongue and teeth and the taste of Dean and cigarettes.

Dean is happy to reciprocate, pressing Cas against the mattress easily, rubbing a hand down his torso and abdomen, pressing his thumbs into his hips as he takes him down his throat.

(When he comes it’s with a whispered “Dean,” his head thrown back, lips parted, and there’s never been a more beautiful sight, Dean’s just sure of it.)

Cas is curled up against him in the afterglow, his smooth back pressed against Dean’s side. Dean has a cigarette, blowing the smoke out over the room, one hand comfortably on Castiel’s hip. 

Castiel stretches, long and lean and lazy and yawns, blinking up at Dean sleepily. He’s high, still, strung out on Dean and smack, beautiful and a tragic fucking ruin.

(They’re both ruined–a tragedy written in the creaks of the mattress, in the noises Castiel makes, in the clink of a whiskey glass and the way Dean’s toes curl. Cas illustrates their story with his fingers on Dean’s skin; he’s the painter this time, turning Dean into a canvas, an artwork of bruises and lovebites.)

Sam confronts him once about the relapse. It’s ugly, and it doesn’t last long.

It’s at the kitchen table, and there Sam sits, elbows on his knees, jaw clenched, and Dean just takes a drink of his beer and stares at the wall.

“You are going to kill yourself,” Sam says, his words measured. His voice is tight and tense. Dean doesn’t say anything. “You don’t care?” Sam asks, and his voice cracks. He clears his throat. “You don’t care if this kills you—it is worth that much to you?”

And Dean doesn’t say what he’s thinking—that Castiel already owns all of the parts of him he would care to save, that anything left after Castiel isn’t worth saving.

Sam stands, and he’s angry, he presses his hands against the table. “Jess and I will help you,” he says, and now he’s pleading, begging. (Because this is his big brother, this is Dean, he can’t lose Dean.) “Please,” Sam says, pressing a hand against Dean’s shoulder, ducking to look into his brother’s eyes. “Please.”

Dean doesn’t move, doesn’t respond. How does he explain? He loves Sam, but Castiel is the other half of his soul and he can’t leave him he can’t.

“Sorry, Sammy,” he says finally, and he lifts the bottle to his lips. Sam turns and walks out.

He doesn’t look back. This is the last time he sees his brother for a year.

Cas comes in from a run to get more smack to find Dean still sitting at the kitchen table. He licks his lips and sits down, heavy, across from Dean.

“How’d it go?” he asks softly, and Dean knows he’s asking because he wants to hear it from Dean, because Cas already knows how it went.

“I can’t do this, Cas,” Dean says, and he finishes his beer. “I can’t do this.”

Cas stands from the table and walks to the place behind Dean. He wraps his arms around his shoulders, presses his cheek into Dean’s neck. “It’ll be okay,” Cas whispers. “It’s alright.”

Dean closes his eyes and grips Castiel’s wrist in his hand. “He begged me, Cas,” Dean says, voice rough. “He stood and begged me and I—I—” He tightens his grip on Castiel, anchors himself. “I can’t do it,” he whispers. “I can’t do it without you, man.”

Castiel presses his lips against Dean’s ear. He doesn’t say anything, but the sure, steady way he moves his hands, the feel of his skin against Dean’s—it’s assurance, as clearly as if he’d spoken it, a promise that he’d never have to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey we're halfway done! neat! thanks for stopping by--i'd love to hear what you think either here, or on my tumblr at paper-mache-lungs. xoxo


	6. fly, pt 1

Dean sticks to his alcohol. Cas always offers, always holds the syringe out, an open invitation.

The first time Dean tries it, Castiel does it for him. Cas doesn’t pressure Dean into it, but he does offer, and Dean takes him up on it once. Castiel smiles and presses his lips, hot and wet against Dean’s neck, licking at his jawline. 

“Relax,” he breathes into Dean’s skin, rolling his sleeve up. He kisses up Dean’s forearm, licks at the crease of his elbow, dirty and perfect, obscene and the best Dean’s ever had.

The prick of the needle isn’t bad. Dean’s never been all that squeamish around needles anyway, and Castiel’s a pro. They sigh together when Cas pushes the drug in, slow and sweet, and Dean feels it burn through his veins, different than the alcohol, still good. 

Cas pulls the needle out and presses his lips against the mark, looking up at Dean.

“You’re gorgeous,” Castiel murmurs against Dean’s skin. “You look so good like this.” He presses Dean back into the mattress, rubs his hands down his chest. Dean feels the drug burn through his system. The room spins and he presses his hands into Castiel’s hips, grounding himself.

He’s always been a little bit afraid of flying.

“It’s okay,” Cas mumbles, drawing up his own dose. “It’s alright.” He slides the needle into his arm and Dean watches, watches Cas’ shoulders ease, a lazy grin work its way across his face. He tosses the syringe over the side of the bed and he straddles Dean on their mattress. “I’ve got you, Dean. I’ve got you.”

Dean’s fingers tangle in the belt loops and Castiel grinds against him, dirty and sexy. “You feel good?” Cas asks, and leans down to press his mouth against his neck. 

“Fucking tease,” Dean breathes, but he’s not mad—this is the sweetest torture he’s ever had, Castiel hot and dirty above him, their erections rubbing together through the thick denim, the heroin burning a sweeter fire into his veins.

“You like it,” Castiel says, warm and cocky, all sex hair and stubble, the sunlight like kisses on his shoulders, the light golden against his skin. “You want me. I can feel it.” He grinds his hips down to punctuate, and Dean hums and groans, his fingers digging into Castiel’s hips.

(This is the sweetest spiral he’s ever had.)

The heroin lights him on fire and they’re both soaring. Castiel and his wings carry him up up up until he’s flying, until there’s nothing else, nothing but Cas and the way he feels pressed against him.

The heroin takes a while to wear off for Dean. He calls out to work the next morning, the first time he’s done so, and he spends the day in bed, letting the drug ease out of his system.

Cas spends it with him, painting lovebites into the expanse of Dean’s skin.

Dean is more than happy to let him, arching up against Cas’ mouth and his hands, a willing canvas.

The second time Dean gets high, he does it when he’s got the weekend to recover, and he does it himself, with Castiel’s supervision. They’re sitting on the couch, and Castiel is straddling Dean in nothing but a dirty pair of jeans. He helps Dean measure it out, the tip of his pink tongue pressed against his top lip, and Dean’s a little bit mesmerized. Castiel looks up at him when he pauses and his face softens. He leans closer to kiss the edge of Dean’s jaw and Dean sighs, his eyes closing.

Castiel shows Dean how to find the vein, using his fingers, hot and needy against his skin, pressing them into the curve of Dean’s elbow.

“Right there,” Castiel breathes, and Dean reaches for the syringe. Castiel cups his hand around Dean’s, guiding it to the place he holds with his fingers. Just before Dean guides the needle into the skin, Cas presses a kiss to the corner of his mouth. “I’ve got you,” he whispers, and then he eases back, watching the needle puncture the skin.

Dean hisses and presses down on the plunger, feeling the burn of the drug in his veins and Castiel leans in to suck a path up Dean’s neck. Dean makes soft, needy sounds, desperate and drugged, high off Castiel and his wings.

Castiel doses himself quickly and then chuckles lazily when Dean sits up, his pupils blown wide. “You look so good like this,” Castiel whispers, running his hands down the ridge of Dean’s ribs. “You feel good?”

Dean grunts and presses Castiel into the couch, fumbling at the fastenings on the jeans. His hands are shaking, he feels like his entire body is vibrating, and Castiel cups the back of his neck, anchors him. Dean sighs and pulls at the zipper, taking Castiel half hard into his mouth.

He blinks and looks up at Castiel—Castiel whose head is thrown back, whose hands are splayed against his thighs, who is making the most obscene noises as Dean sucks him to full hardness. Cas looks down at him and Dean looks up, his mouth wrapped around Castiel, his palms pressed against his knees. Cas tangles his fingers in Dean’s hair, anchors him, and his hips twitch, and Dean closes his eyes and swallows him down.

“You look good like this,” Cas whispers. “You look so good like this.”

He doesn’t always shoot up with Castiel. He still prefers the slide of the alcohol to the sweet burn of heroin, and he spends most nights sitting on the couch with Cas sprawled in his lap, blinking up at the ceiling, slow and lazy.

There’s sex sometimes—most times. Castiel takes him on the couch, on the mattress, in the bathroom, the kitchen, and against the far wall where Dean’s head hits the drywall so hard the neighbors bang back and they collapse into helpless laughter, still hard and slick and aching.

Dean’s favorite is in their room, in their bedroom, with Castiel’s clothes on the floor and their bed squeaking under them, with the light filtering through the dirty windows and playing across Cas’ back. That is Dean’s favorite place. It’s Cas’ too.

The first time Castiel asks Dean to shoot him up, he declines. (Dean can’t, he won’t, he can barely do it himself without Castiel standing over him, coaching him.)

Castiel keeps at it though, and on a Monday morning in late October, when the light is coming through the windows, frozen sunshine, lighting Castiel’s face and his eager blue eyes, Dean says yes.

He straddles Castiel on the couch and Cas stretches his arm out, his eyes on Dean.

Dean is careful—so careful—licking his lips as he presses the needle to Castiel’s skin, wanting desperately to press his lips against the flush of arousal he knows is crawling up Castiel’s face and down his chest, all Dean wants to do is taste the tanned flesh under him, but Castiel squirms, and Dean remembers.

He doesn’t expect to feel so powerful. Aroused, sure—Castiel is sinful when he’s getting high, all parted lips and wasted moans, pupils wide and chest flushed—and in love, absolutely—because there is nothing Dean won’t do for Castiel—but the power trip is the one he’s unprepared for. It leaves him light-headed and he gasps. Castiel cracks an eyes open and a lazy smirk crawls over his face. He sits up, his hands cupping Dean’s ass through his jeans, and presses his lips against the pulse he can see jumping under the skin.

“Feels good, doesn’t it?” Castiel whispers. “There’s nothing like it. Getting high is—is great, is awesome. Getting someone else high, though…” Castiel leans in to press his lips and his tongue against the curve of Dean’s collarbone. “Like you hold their life in the palm of your hands, like you’re their end and their beginning.” He licks a trail to Dean’s bicep. “You feel like—” he flashes blue eyes up to Dean’s, smirks against his skin. “Like God.”

Dean closes his eyes and presses his lips under Castiel’s ear. “If I’m God, what does that make you?” he asks the other man, working against him, slow and sweet.

Castiel laughs, lazy and breathless. “Would it be too cheesy to say I was your angel?”

Dean doesn’t really top. It’s not his thing—even when he fucked girls, he preferred to let them have most of the control. Castiel tops—Castiel loves to top. But there are some times when both of them make an exception.

Tonight is one of those exceptions.

Castiel is higher than a fucking kite, and his movements are like molasses, slow and sweet. He’s pliant under Dean’s touch, soft and syrupy. Dean can move him, mold him, and he does, presses Castiel down into the mattress, into the sheets. He’s wearing nothing but a t-shirt and a pair of boxers, and they’ve been chain smoking for the better part of five hours. Castiel’s skin smells like cigarettes and something sweet, like sweat and something that is just very distinctly Castiel and Dean nips his way down through the t-shirt, tasting his skin, his nipples, and mouthing at his cock through the boxers.

Castiel makes a noise that makes Dean’s cock jump and he drags the boxers down by the elastic waistband, letting Castiel’s dick spring free. He takes the leaking head into his mouth, eases down Castiel’s length and back up, watching Castiel groan and twitch and grip the sheets in both hands.

Dean takes his time prepping Castiel.

“I’m not a virgin,” Castiel groans, and he chuckles, breathless and needy.

Dean hums against him, pressing his tongue against the puffy hole. He is very much aware that Castiel is not a virgin.

Cas bends under him like a willow tree, warm and pliant, and Dean presses into him with a deep, satisfied sigh. Castiel grunts and shifts, adjusting to Dean, and then he presses his hands against Dean’s on his thighs. He looks up at the other man, tilting his head back, letting his eyes slip closed and his mouth fall open as Dean slip-slides in and out of him, slow and easy, going deep.

Dean watches Castiel fall apart under him. One of the things he likes about topping for Castiel is that he can watch the other man come undone at the seams.

The noises Castiel makes are obscene; soft, clipped moans, needy whining in the back of his throat, grunts and gasps. He doesn’t say a whole lot during sex (neither one of them really do, aside from the occasional dirty talk on Castiel’s part when he feels like it) but he’s certainly not quiet, especially not now that they have their own place.

Dean can tell when he’s close; can read it in the grip of Cas’ fingers on his own, can tell in the press of his head against the pillow, in the way his cock bobs, painting his abdomen in the slippery-slick of precome. Dean angles his hips when Cas presses up against him and Cas sighs his name, and it’s a prayer and a plea—Dean closes his eyes and slides his hand up Cas’ shaft once, twice, three times—and Cas is coming on a choked gasp, jerking and twitching.

It’s worth it to top, the few times Dean does—worth it to watch Castiel fall apart so beautifully under him, worth it to watch him come back together, slow and sated, lazy and high off of smack and Dean.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'd love to hear any thoughts you care to spare. thanks, as always, for reading. xoxo


	7. believe

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> buckle up, buttercups

He regrets it once.

Castiel sleeps very sporadically; usually when Dean wakes up in the middle of the night, Castiel is already awake, watching the moonlight on Dean’s skin, or shooting up again. Sometimes both. 

And then sometimes Castiel will sleep for hours and Dean will watch him, sprawled out on the mattress, pressed up against Dean, his breathing slow and even and comforting against Dean’s skin.

It happens when Dean is sleeping and Cas is awake.

Dean doesn’t know much about how much Castiel takes. He does it with him occasionally, but Dean’s always preferred the bite-burn of alcohol to the sting of a needle–he prefers to swallow his poison, that’s all.

But Dean wakes up and it’s quiet–way too quiet to mean anything good. It’s three in the morning, and he looks for Cas but doesn’t see him. 

He finds him on the floor of their living room. His lips are blue–blue, they’re fucking blue–and he doesn’t wake up when Dean yells, doesn’t wake up when Dean shakes him, doesn’t respond at all, limp and still and quiet.

Dean doesn’t remember much of the ER waiting room. There’s a whole pack of cigarettes gone, and he’s out, and he thinks about walking across the street to the Walgreens to get another pack, but what if something happens while he’s away what if—

He’s drinking hospital sludge coffee in between chain smoking, and he’s got a tower of Styrofoam cups, stretching towards the heavens. He’s on his tenth cup of hospital sludge when the doctor comes out and asks for family.

There isn’t any family, and Dean tells him as much, no family, just Dean, and the doctor sighs and says something about a HIPPAA, and Dean grips the doctor tight by his arms. “You don’t have to tell me shit,” Dean growls. “I just want to see him.”

Dean can read the judgement in his eyes. He doesn’t care.

“I will call security,” the doctor announces, and Dean lets him go, eyes dark.

“I just want to see him,” Dean repeats. The buzz of nicotine and caffeine under his skin makes him restless, antsy, but he tries to swallow it down, tries to stay calm. He closes his eyes and tries to find a piece of Cas inside of him, tries to emulate some of the peace the other man emanates. He needs Cas.

The doctor sighs and beckons a nurse in purple scrubs over. The woman looks tired, looks worn thin. “This man is with the gentleman in Trauma 6,” he says stiffly.

Dean looks at the woman, and her posture changes. The sentence means more to her than it does to Dean, some secret medical code. Her eyes soften and she grips Dean by the elbow, leading him back into the belly of the ER.

Cas does not look like Cas.

He’s wearing an oxygen mask that dwarfs his face, and he’s grey, washed out, the color bleached from his skin into the surrounding room. His head is tilted back against a pillow, dark hair a disheveled mess. He doesn’t look to be in any kind of immediate distress—his lips aren’t blue anymore, anyway—and he’s breathing normal again, no more of the jerky, staggered breaths that seem to take his entire body’s effort.

Dean heaves a sigh and sits down next to Castiel. He stirs at the movement and works to open his eyes, squinting at Dean.

“Dean?” he asks hoarsely and Dean forces a smile onto his numb lips, reaching for Cas’ hand lying still on the bed.

“Hey, Cas,” he says tiredly. “How you feeling?”

Cas shifts on the stretcher, leans his head back against the pillow. “Fucked,” he croaks—Cas’ voice is a shade of what it should be, ragged and strained. “Not in a good way.”

Dean tries to laugh at the attempted joke, but its wooden and cold, sitting in the center of his chest.

The other man turns his head to look at Dean. “They’re going to keep me,” he says. “Until they can decide if I’m suicidal or not.” He chuckles. “But it’s going to get ugly, Dean—you—you should leave.”

Dean sighs and leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “Ugly like withdrawal.”

Cas nods, closes his eyes. “Yeah. They—I’ve been here before. They’ll dose me up with methadone, but it’s not—it’s not the same. It’s a different high, duller.” He frowns and shifts in the bed again, reaching up to pull the oxygen mask off. “Like—if heroin’s wings, methadone’s…hang gliding.” He chuckles at his own joke and rakes a hand through his hair. “It takes the edge off, but—” Cas shakes his head. “It’s not anything close to the real deal. Like—” he swallows painfully and licks at his lips— “like playing pretend.”

Dean sighs and rubs a hand across his hair. “I’ll stay, Cas. I want to.”

“You’re a crazy bastard,” Cas says. He looks directly at Dean, then, and grips the hand still resting on his own on the bed. “Seriously, Dean. You don’t want to see this. I’m—I’m not myself.”

Dean laughs then, and squeezes Cas’ hand. “You talk like I’ve never been through withdrawal myself, man.” He licks his lips and looks at Cas, serious. “It’s okay. It’ll be okay, Cas. It’ll be alright.”

Cas is in the hospital for three days. Cas was right. It isn’t pretty.

Castiel is hot and cold, sweaty and restless. He throws the sheets off the bed and then shakes until Dean tucks them back around him. He sweats through three gowns in the first eight hours and then gives up on clothes all together, wearing a pair of cotton boxers and nothing else, shaking and shivering under the sheets.

His muscles ache and he can’t keep anything down. Dean rubs his back when he can stand to be touched, combs his fingers through his hair, says things Castiel probably can’t hear, but that he needs to.

The nurses don’t ever say anything, but they don’t need to. Dean can see it in their eyes. It’s nothing new. Fuck, he’s seen that look in Sam’s eyes so many times that at this point he’s mostly immune.

One night, after Castiel has just lost whatever parts of his dinner he choked down, and is finally sleeping, a nurse brings him a pamphlet on drug rehab and he looks up at her. 

“I’ve been where he is,” she says, and her voice is soft. “It’s hard but it’s doable.”

"No thanks,” Dean says, and his voice is harsh, dismissive. He turns his back on the nurse and watches the smudges of lashes against Castiel’s cheek in the moonlight. 

“He’s lucky to have you,” she says after a moment. “But you—you’re an addict too.”

Dean doesn’t reply.

“He’s lucky to have you,” she repeats, and her shoes squeak softly as she leaves, the door clicking shut behind her.

She leaves the pamphlet. Dean goes to throw it away and thinks about it for half a second. Maybe they should try sober again, maybe—

But then he remembers Castiel sucking his cock, looking up at him, pupils blown wide, and he knows Cas won’t survive rehab twice.

Castiel rolls over at the rustle of paper, the squeak-scuff of the nurse’s shoes. He blinks his eyes open and Dean is still looking at the pamphlet. Castiel frowns, reaches to press a hand over the paper.

“Not trading me in for another model are you?” he asks, his voice rough.

“Course not,” Dean says, drops the pamphlet in the trash. “Never.” He sighs and rubs a hand down Castiel’s arm. “How you feeling?”

Castiel licks at his lips and shifts in the bed, grimacing. “Like shit.”

“You look like shit,” Dean offers, leaning back in the hard plastic chair.

Castiel sighs and closes his eyes. Dean leans close again and rubs a thumb against Castiel’s arm. “Cas—“

“Please don’t.” Castiel’s voice is quiet, strained. He sounds like hell. “Please don’t, not to me.”

Dean just sighs and rubs his forehead. “You just scared me, Cas.”

“Sorry,” he mumbles, and then looks at Dean, his eyes blue like ice. “I’m sorry, Dean, I really am. But—”

“I know,” Dean interjects. “Okay? I know.”

Cas sighs and rubs a hand over his eyes. “I’m sorry.”

(Dean believes him.)

Castiel is released from the hospital on a rainy Wednesday. Dean drives slow on the way home, and Castiel is anxious and horny, aching for a fix and a fuck.

He’s got Dean pressed against the door as soon as it clicks shut behind him (someone fresh out of the hospital should not be this strong, this desperate) and Dean protests a moment (because he loves Castiel, needs Castiel, just as surely as Castiel needs him) and “let’s go to bed, we can do it in the bed,” but Castiel ignores him, dropping to his knees. 

Dean doesn’t protest much beyond that–Castiel’s mouth is around his cock, hot and needy, his hands are scrabbling at the ridges of his hips, Castiel’s wanton and desperate and Dean fucking loves him like this.

He shoots up after Dean comes, messy and embarrassingly fast, mostly in Castiel’s mouth but also on his face and his shirt (which is probably Dean’s anyway, it hangs off of Castiel) and Castiel just laughs, breathless and already halfway high, wiping his face with his fingers and sucking them clean.

Dean watches him quietly from the couch, his shirt off and jeans undone, watches as Castiel measures it out and presses the needle against his skin. “Be careful,” Dean whispers before he can stop himself and Cas chuckles, breathless. He shakes his head and presses the plunger down. 

Castiel’s eyes roll back in his head and Dean waits, holds his breath for one-two-three-four heartbeats and then Castiel’s eyes open, pupils wide, grin lazy. He drags kisses all up Dean’s chest, sucks a mark against his jaw and “I’m always careful.”

Dean sighs and grips his hips, pulling at the elastic. Castiel is hard and leaking, his cock arched against his belly.

“Fuck,” Castiel breathes and Dean leans closer, pressing his forehead against Castiel’s shoulder, rubbing his hand up and down Cas’ shaft.

Castiel twitches in his palm and presses his lips against Dean’s neck, grunting softly into his ear.

“Gonna come?” Dean asks softly, curving his fingers around Cas, rubbing his thumb over the head.

Cas inhales sharply and jerks against Dean, and then he’s spilling into Dean’s hand and all over his stomach, hot and wet.

Dean licks it off his fingers and then kneels to clean the rest of the mess up. Cas’ fingers go to his hair, scratching at his scalp, and then smoothing his hands down the sides of Dean’s face, cupping around the back of his neck.

It’s thank you, and Cas doesn’t have to say a word.

Cas is more careful, from then on out. Dean’s stomach ties itself in a knot whenever he measures it out until Castiel presses him down against the mattress. “I won’t do it to you again, I swear, I swear,” he whispers into Dean’s skin. “I’m sorry it happened. It will not happen again.”

(Dean believes him.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'd love to hear any thoughts you'd care to spare. xoxo.


	8. grind

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cas and Dean skip family Thanksgiving.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry for taking a five month break. Things got hairy. I'm back, and I'm gonna finish this beast. If you're still here, buckle up.

They don’t have a lot to do with their families, anymore.

They’ve seen themselves on different sides now; Dean and Cas have made it painfully obvious that they will always always always choose each other regardless of the terms.

Castiel doesn’t talk about his family much. Dean knows he has a couple older brothers and an older sister, and that his parents are the very much hands-off type, and that they’re eccentric (they named their son Castiel, for Chrissakes) but that’s about as much as Dean gets out of Cas.

He doesn’t mind. He doesn’t want to talk about his family either—he told Cas plenty when he talked about his Dad’s drinking, and all of the ways he’s failed his little brother—he doesn’t have a whole lot to say beyond that.

Dean only meets Cas’s family twice. Once at the graduation from rehab, and one time when they came over to the apartment.

Castiel is more tense than Dean has ever seen him. He shoots up before they come, and he has to excuse himself to the bathroom halfway through their visit. Dean meets him in there, and Cas is pale and sweaty, resting his forehead on his knees, sitting on the floor of the bathroom, his back against the sink.

He looks young, younger than Dean has ever seen him, and Dean sits down next to him. Castiel leans closer.

“I need it, Dean,” he says hoarsely, and Dean fumbles the stash out, rolls Castiel’s sleeve up, presses his lips against Castiel’s smooth forearm, and eases the needle down into the vein. Castiel’s head hits the sink with the dull thunk and the noise that comes out of his mouth is downright obscene.

Dean tosses the spent syringe in the sink and straddles Castiel on the floor of their bathroom, pressing his lips against the curve of his throat.

He can feel the tension fall out of Castiel. His shoulders drop, and he gives a deep, satisfied sigh. Dean hums against the other man’s skin, rubbing his hands down his arms.

“It’s okay,” Dean mumbles. “It’s alright.”

Cas curls his fingers around Dean’s wrists. “I know. I know.”

___

It is Thanksgiving morning. Dean’s phone buzzes on the table next to their bed and he rolls over, blinking off the high from the night before. Castiel is awake, sitting cross-legged at the foot of the bed, smoking, watching Dean quietly. He smiles when Dean rolls over.

“’Lo?” he grunts into the phone, sitting up in bed. It’s his mother.

“Why don’t you come for dinner?” she asks in a rush, her words coming all at once. “You—you can bring your friend.”

Dean looks up at Cas—serene, peaceful, watching Dean with his blue blue eyes, waiting—and then swallows, his brain slow and cigarette-smoke hazy.

His mother doesn’t give him the opportunity to reply, her words tumbling out of her mouth like an avalanche, fast and nervous. “I’m making turkey, and pie. Jess is going to bring Texas potatoes, I know you like those, and Sammy wants to see you, I know he does. I want to see you.” She pauses. He can hear her anxiety over the phone, crackling through the speakers.

“We’ve got plans,” he rasps into the mouthpiece, his eyes on Cas. “Cas and I—we’ve already got plans.” He doesn’t wait for her response, just ends the call and returns the phone to its spot on the bedside table, scratching at his stubble.

Castiel exhales a cloud of smoke, unfolds his body like an accordion, long and lean, and crawls up the length of the bed to press Dean back into the mattress. He smells like sex and sweat and smoke, rubbing the scratch of his stubble against Dean’s neck, pressing his lips to the pulse he can see jumping there.

Dean sighs and his hands go to Castiel’s hips, pressing his thumbs into the curve of the bone. Castiel is so thin, wiry.

“We could, if you wanted to,” he says, curling his fingers behind Dean’s neck. “I don’t mind.” He smirks, presses his lips against the curve of Dean’s jaw. “I’d wear underwear.”

“I don’t,” Dean says shortly. He leaves everything else unsaid. _I don’t want to see the disappointment in my mother’s eyes. I don’t want to see the anger in my brother’s. I don’t want to look at my almost-sister and feel like a fuck up. I want to stay here, and I want you to stay, too._

If Thanksgiving is a time to be thankful, then Dean wants to spend it being thankful for Castiel—for the curve of his hipbones against his palm, for the brush of his hair on the nape of his neck, for the lazy summer day blue of his eyes, for the million things he loves about Castiel. If Thanksgiving is a time to be thankful, then Dean wants to spend it thanking whatever god there is for Castiel, not feeling ashamed, not feeling broken.

Castiel makes him feel like he’s worth something, like he’s something to be thankful for, too.

They celebrate in their own way, getting each other high and high off of each other. Dean’s phone rings again, at five. It’s his mother. He doesn’t answer, just lets his eyes slide shut with the press of Castiel into him, Cas’ soft grunts in his ear the only thing he needs.

(His mother leaves a message. He deletes it without ever hearing it.)

____

Sam calls, the next day, and Dean watches his brother’s number flash on the screen, listening to the shower sputter to life, Castiel cursing quietly as he peels his clothes off. He considers joining him briefly, but the moment passes and drapes an arm across his eyes, letting Sam’s call ring through to the voicemail. Sam doesn’t leave one, and Dean tosses the phone onto the bedside table and goes to join Castiel.

Cas is coming down, head stuck under the spray of the shower, eyes closed. The bathroom is dingy, dirty light filtering through a skylight, Cas’ bare feet framing the drain. He’s humming to himself tunelessly, and Dean smiles, leaning against the door jamb.

It’s a choice. That’s what he has to remember, that this is a choice that he has to make every day. It’s an easy choice, but what they teach them about sobriety is just as true of addiction; that every day is a choice.

Today he chooses Castiel, he thinks, and tugs his pants off at the door, kicking them back into the bedroom and stepping under the warm spray, pressing his palms into the jut of Castiel’s hipbones.

Cas turns with a dopey smile and drops to his knees.

Shower sex isn’t easy, but shower blowjobs are something Dean can get behind, and he wraps his fingers into Castiel’s hair, and guides his soft mouth up and down his cock, pressing his fingers into the crease behind Castiel’s jaw.

Castiel grunts softly and pulls his mouth off of Dean’s cock, pressing a soft kiss to the inside of Dean’s groin, letting the smooth skin of Dean’s dick rub up against his scruff. “Did you call your mother?”

“No,” Dean said, raking his fingers into Castiel’s wet hair, scraping his nails against his scalp.

Cas hums softly and takes Dean back into his mouth, looking up at Dean this time through the water, wide blue eyes like oceans in his face, bracing his palms on Dean’s thighs.

Castiel sucks cock like he does everything else—like it’s the last chance he’s going to get. Dean doesn’t last long, smoothing a thumb across Cas’ forehead and pressing his palm into the crown of Castiel’s head. It’s as much warning as he gives the other man and Castiel’s eyes close as Dean grunts and jerks and comes, shooting into Castiel’s mouth as the man drinks him down.

\--

“You should call her.”

Castiel is watching the way the smoke from Dean’s fifth cigarette drifts up against the ceiling, damp hair against his thigh, fingers pressing against the ridge of denim at his hip.

“Probably.” Dean’s not going to deny that he probably should call his mother; he probably should, she would love to hear from him. He’s not going to.

Cas sighs, deep, and rolls over, shifting so he can straddle Dean’s lap, pressing his lips against the hook of Dean’s jaw. “Call your mother, Dean.”

Dean finishes his fifth cigarette and presses the butt against the growing pile on the bedside table. “Later.”

They both know he doesn’t mean it, but Castiel lets the matter drop, pushing Dean back into the bed and grinding down against him, slow and dirty.

Dean doesn’t think about his mother when Castiel stretches him open. He doesn’t think about Sammy, and he doesn’t think about Thanksgiving, or skipping Thanksgiving with them, or any of that.

He thinks about Castiel, about his breath on his neck as he huffs into his skin, hips snapping forward again and again.

“I love you,” Dean mumbles into the other man’s hair, moving his hands to grip Castiel’s wrists. Castiel grunts softly into Dean’s shoulder, snapping his hips forward again, lifting his head to seek out Dean’s lips, pressing his lips, swollen and chapped, against Dean’s. “I love you,” he mumbles, and Cas bites Dean’s lower lip.

“I know.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, I'd love to hear any thoughts you care to spare.  
> xoxo


End file.
